Weekly Update - 3/23/21 - Get Your Stroll On, Baby (Patreon)

It's been a busy week, so let's just jump right into it, shall we? Since our last weekly update, I've pushed out Quaranteam 40 and Threadbinders 3, and am on track to get If I'm Honest 9 on Friday and Brewster's Brood 12 for next Tuesday, with BB13 coming on 4/5. As tempting as it was to do an April Fool's story for 4/1, I'm just going to put out Quaranteam 41 instead, and probably also the profile for that month for those of you at the tiers 3 and above, which based on the poll results so far looks like it's resoundingly going to be Niko. (Insider secret: I sort of expected that when I wrote the first profile from Niko's point of view.) If you're interested in seeing those profiles, and in voting in which character is guaranteed to get a sex scene within a given month in both Quaranteam and Brewster's Brood, consider upgrading to a tier 3 subscription and make your voice heard. There's still time to upset the poll!

Speaking of polls, currently 4/8 is looking like it'll be Morgana's Gift 10, so I guess everyone's eager to see the fallout from the first Midas Day.

Also in good news, I'm going to announce a new project today, one which everyone will (eventually) get to enjoy. It's a five-part story called Quaranteam: Piper's Prelude and the first chapter is already written and in the can. It's a commissioned work, and I'd been interested in seeing the whole serum process from one of the women's perspectives, and when someone asked if I'd be interested in doing a spin-off on how Piper got from her life as an Olympian to Covington's house to Andy's partner, I knew that was a story I'd be interested in telling. Again, I want to stress, it's only going to be five parts long, with a part coming each month. I'll release the first chapter to patrons some time next month (currently on the schedule for 4/12), and new chapters monthly thereafter, as I continue to develop it along with the commissioner, who had some great thoughts about it, and some wonderful questions about the QT universe on the whole. The first chapter will likely hit public sites the first weekend in July.

Speaking of public release schedule, here's what's coming when for the next month: 3/26 - QT 37, 4/2 - Threadbinders 2, 4/9 - QT 38, 4/16 - Janus Coins: John's Story 2, 4/23 - Morgana's Gift 8, 4/30 - QT 39. 

Each month, the public releases get a little bit further behind the content I'm generating, and when we get to the point where things on the Patreon are six months ahead, I may start doing some weeks with two pieces released publicly instead of one. That's still a bit in the future, but it's getting there, especially with how much I've been producing lately.

That brings us to the other thing, and for those of you with no interest in ever commissioning work, you can just tap out here and I'll you see on Friday or Saturday. As of now, I am effectively closing off the $30 commissioner rate. What I mean by this is that new people can still sign up for the $30 level, but they are not going to get a commissioned work. You're just tier 4s who want to tip, and for that I thank you immensely. (Note: There are a couple of people I'm currently in negotiations about commissions with, and to THOSE people, if you want to sign up, you still have this level available for a very brief window, because I know who you are.)

 Existing $30 commissioners, this doesn't affect you at all - you'll still get your monthly stories and your rates are not going to change unless you leave and come back, at which point you'll come in as a current commissioner (i.e. the higher rate). 

When I started doing this, I think nearly every person who contacted me about being a commissioner early on said the same thing -- "Are you sure? Your rate is probably too low." And I knew that it was, but I wanted to provide some proof-of-concept stuff so that people could see that my commissioned work was worth it, and I told everyone that if the demand kept creeping up, my rates would definitely go up. 

Effective immediately, the new commissioner rate is $75 a month. This might sound like a lot, but it's well below my commercial rate, where a 5,000 word piece will run you between $300-$800. I like doing commissioned work, but it's time consuming, and it comes with more restrictions, especially since some commissioners want to keep the work all for themselves, which, let me stress, is fine, but that means it's content I can't release here. With the commissions of QTPT and QTPP, these are things that will ease off deadlines and bring in a little extra money for me, so I'm a little more lenient about them.

Is my price going to go up again in the future? I dunno. Probably? It sort of depends on what the demand is and how much time I have total to spread around. I produced over 50k words worth of content for patrons in the month of February, which is over half the length of the average novel, and this is still just my side hustle. Quaranteam itself is over a quarter of a million words long. That means I'm nearing Game of Thrones length there.  I'd love for this to be my full-time gig, but the readership needs to continue to grow, and the influx of new members has slowed considerably so we'll see what happens. 

So, tl;dr - for existing commissioners, nothing's changing for you. For anyone who's considering getting commissioned work from me in the future, the deal that was too good to be true turned out to be such, and new rates are available for those still interested.

Last thing, I've been listening to a bunch of The Afghan Whigs lately, and if you haven't heard their albums "1965," "Black Love" and/or "Gentlemen," you should get right on that.

The Afghan Whigs: Going To Town - YouTube